The home can be a dangerous place.

With toddlers crawling, scooting along furniture and pulling themselves up, danger lurks in every corner. Or inside the kitchen. Or inside the bathroom.

Baby apparel, furniture, equipment and toys can pose threats to the safety of tykes.

Armed with childproof devices and baby-product recall lists, parents can reduce the risk of accidents and, more importantly, the risk of death.

According to Safe Kids Worldwide, a nonprofit group that educates the public on children's safety issues, accidental injury still is the leading cause of death of young children.

That's a statistic to which mom Rebecca Breaux doesn't want to contribute. So Breaux and her husband, Ashley, are childproofing a new home.

It's important because the couple's daughters, Carolyn, 9 months, and Elena, 2, are pretty busy these days.

Carolyn is crawling and pulling herself up. She's also cruising around furniture. Elena can open refrigerator doors and cabinets. She also enjoys sitting at the community pool.

About two months ago, however, Breaux got a scare.

"Elena was sitting on the pool steps and I turned my head for a second and when I looked back, Elena was underwater," Breaux says.

"I learned two things from that," she said. "First, it only takes a second for something to happen, and it can happen to even the best parent."

Around the house, Breaux is installing caps that cover electrical outlets and childproof cabinet pulls in their Melbourne, Fla., home.

She got rid of the family coffee table because the sharp edges posed too much of a threat. She's constantly inspecting toys and other household items for small pieces that can cause choking.

Breaux also plans to buy a safety gate to keep the girls out of the kitchen.

No matter how many safety devices a parent installs, the most important safety measure is supervision.

"Babyproofing your home is similar to child-resistant caps," Breaux said. "There is really no such thing. Kids are smart and will eventually figure it out, and your home is the same way. You can do everything you can, but it doesn't take the place of constant supervision."

September is Baby Safety Month and is a good time to encourage parents to take action.

A database that alerts parents to recalls and offers safety tips for cribs, high chairs, car seats, swings, strollers and baby clothing is provided by the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which is responsible for posting recalls and investigating reports of faulty products.

"It's not so much that parents are not paying attention to the safety of their children, but busy parents sometimes don't have time to look recall information up," Rauscher says.

Baby-store merchant Margaret Rauscher suggests parents try acting like a crawling toddler.

By crawling on the floor, parents see what their children see. Exposed phone and computer wires, for example, may only be noticed from a low level.

There are many safety devices out there to help parents keep kids safe, says Gary Lee, owner of Parent Units, a New Jersey company that creates childproofing products.

The company's products include the Topple Stop, which secures furniture to walls, and Safety Straps, which keep home equipment, such as televisions, stereos and microwaves, from slipping and sliding around children.

"We are advocating that people check their furniture to make sure it cannot be toppled over," Lee says. "Dressers, wall units and bookcases are all things that need to be checked."

While parents might think items placed high up are safe, think again. Children love to climb and will do so to retrieve something. That means they also can fall.

Lee urges parents to remember windows and doors when installing safety devices that keep small hands from opening them. Also, keep furniture away from dangling cords to avoid accidental stranglings.

"We want parents to become more aware and more concerned and to realize that the home is a dangerous place for children," Lee says.